The Daily Telegraph has published a recording of a phone conversation between the Culture Secretary's adviser and one of its reporters investigating her expense claims in 2012, in which the aide "flagged up" her boss' role in the future of press regulation.

Maria Miller has denied that she had used her position overseeing the post-Leveson reforms of press regulation to ward off the Telegraph. She told the Evening Standard:

This has nothing to do with the Leveson inquiry. My concern is that any investigation is done in accordance with the rules, the Editors' Code. What I did was to contact the editor of the Telegraph directly to express my concern at the way his investigation was being undertaken.

The journalist hadn't contacted my office first. She had doorstepped a member of my family, a person who is not in public life, a person ill-equipped to deal with national media inquiries on my behalf.

Mrs Miller's special adviser, Joanna Hindley, reportedly told Telegraph reporters investigating her expenses: "Maria has obviously been having quite a lot of editors' meetings around Leveson at the moment. I am just going to flag up that connection for you to think about."